A Calculated Leap

What do you write when you have a blank new blog in front of you? You could start by sharing about yourself and the site. That would seem logical and that’s exactly what I’m going to do. (A rare use of logic, I assure you.)

I’m currently a youth pastor in a little town, nestled quietly in the Fingerlakes of New York. It’s a job and place that I love, though I never “planned” any of it. A bunch of years ago, while attending Syracuse University (VPA) for Illustration, I knew I didn’t want to answer the siren’s call to NYC, like almost all of my classmates. That leaves a young artist few professional options. I opted for my other love, investing in the lives of young people, shelving my artistic ambitions for a while.

Fast forward to here and now. I have been a youth pastor by day and a designer/illustrator by night for the last five years. The love of both kind of wrapping themselves together like the light-sabers in “Space Balls.” I’ve been content with this set-up. Things are good. I’ve helped pull some kids off the scrap heap and created some “good” work, professionally.

As with all things, change is on the horizon. My wife and I have just moved to Binghamton, NY and plan on staying here for a while. She’s got a job she loves, which is good (I don’t want to move all of our stuff again anytime soon). I’m commuting an hour to church for the next year, while planning to step out into the freelance world, full-time. This site being a pre-emptive step in that direction.

I plan on writing about things that catch my fancy, in the world of illustration and design and posting almost daily “sketches” in the sketchbook. I hope to write well, be of interest to people with similar interests and aims, and be somewhat coherent and/or witty. (I also plan on cleaning up the code, learning more about CSS, EE, and RSS as it goes.)

All in all? Sometimes “calculated risks” and “well thought out business strategies” feel more like “leaps of faith”, right?
Hope to see you all on the way.

This is where I ramble on and you tell me about it below. Ok, I actually hope to do more than ramble, but the jury is still out.